Be Comfortable, Creature
by Vii Zee
Summary: Sequel to 'This Mortal Coil'. Santana needs to learn to be comfortable in her own skin. And that's what Glee Club is there to do.


She gripped Brittany's hand and squeezed, blindly letting all her focus out into the sensation of her hands.

"I can't do this."

"Yes. You can. Just walk in there and tell them, tell them all."

She sighed and walked through the door, dragging Brittany behind her. The choir room was already full, everyone had arrived before. Mr Schue was speaking to Blaine, something about a duet with Rachel at Regionals, and Brittany suddenly took the lead, dragging Santana to stand next to the piano. Brad looked at her and gave her a sly wink, and Santana smiled at him. Of course, Brad knew. He had been there when Songbird happened. He was a nice guy.

"Mr Schue? Santana wants to say something to the club," Brittany sweetly told him, and Schuester nodded and moved to the side, standing on the opposite side of the piano, Santana reached behind her, grabbing onto the black instrument's frame and gripping tightly, her knuckles turning white, threatening to splinter the wood.

"Santana?"

She cleared her throat.

"The reason I was so…depressed last week, was because I haven't exactly been comfortable with myself lately. I'm not happy with who I am, with what I am, and…I felt as if the only real way to get rid of what was happening to me was to end it all. And I know, I know how stupid of me it was to think that!" she half-yelled, stopping any protests in their tracks. "But you guys don't know what I was going through. And now you do. So please…just try to understand my situation here. I'm…"

She paused, feeling every eye in the room train on her. She saw Brittany encourage her with her hand, twirling it in a circular motion. She swallowed hard.

"I'm gay."

Nobody in the room says anything. They're too busy interacting with their eyes. Finn is staring at her like Ross on 'FRIENDS' when he found out his wife was gay. Well, she did have sex with the boy. Puck is staring too, but proudly. He knows how hard this was for her. Then there's Rachel and Quinn who give each other knowingly glances, Blaine and Kurt who get up and move towards her, giving her quick hugs in support. Mercedes is huffing alone, while Artie is staring at Brittany wide-eyed, everything making sense again. Tina and Mike are smiling at her, they don't really care, in fact they kind of knew.

And then Santana smiled at them and went to take a seat between Quinn and Brittany.

The look in Brittany's eyes is the most amazing she's seen so far.

* * *

><p>For a few days, the school's quiet. It's almost like they're afraid of confronting her about it. And she think that it's safe, people are still scared of her.<p>

That is until a few Cheerios gang up on her and throw slushies at her, of course.

It's not normally something a girl would do, the slushie thing. But when it's self-absorbed brats like these who think that just because she's gay she was staring at them in the changing room all this time, it pretty much hurts just as much as when a guy would do it.

It always feels like an ice berg bitch slapped you, though.

Then, the whole school uproars.

They start to tease her, throw comments at her, smirk when she passes by. She tries to keep up with it all, to try and adapt, but it's hard.

The cracks start to show at Glee, when she started to ask Puck to walk out of the room with her, so that maybe they wouldn't attack her. He was sweet about it, even got Finn and Mike to walk with them to her car. Soon, they all knew, and soon they were pretty much forming a perimeter around her.

They always wanted to do that.

* * *

><p>When Coach Sue finds out, Santana is infinitely surprised at how supporting she is. She catches her normally fiery co-captain drenched in red corn syrup in the bathroom, dabbing at her eyes with a towel and wincing at how much it hurt. She was hissing when Sue placed a hand on her shoulder.<p>

"What's wrong, Sandbags?" she asked when she had Santana's full attention.

"OH, like you don't know! You know everything that goes on in this school!" Santana yelled at her, throwing the paper towel into the sink and grabbing another one.

"Well, yes, I do know, I won't deny that. I just wanted to hear the words coming from your mouth. Makes it more official and embarrassing for you!"

"Well, you know what?" Santana spun around, resting against the sink and staring up at the Coach, "I'm gay. I said it. I like girls, I like having sex with girls, I like staring at other girls twirling around in extremely short skirts, I like making out with girls and groping them and you know what? I'm not ashamed." Her voice broke as she reached the last word, and she turned back to the sink and hung her head, her fingers gripping the porcelain with all her might.

Sue was quiet, which made Santana think she had left. But then she heard a small laugh and raised her eyes to the mirror.

"Well, Santana, I just want you to know that this in no way affects your place on the Cheerios. You are still my co-captain, and I will not kick you off. However, I will tell you this. Don't be afraid of who you are. Don't let other people tell you that you should be ashamed, because who you are is who you were meant to be. Understood?"

Santana looked at Sue's eyes through the mirrors and smiled softly. "Thanks, Coach."

"I expect to see you at practice tomorrow."

"Yes, Coach."

* * *

><p>Puck and Mike dropped her off at her car after Glee Club a few days later and didn't leave as they normally did. They stood there, their arms crossed over their chests, leaning against the hood of her car.<p>

"So, Santana, when are you gonna tell the world you have a girlfriend?"

She stared at Mike, her eyes wide and scared. He didn't speak much, but when he did, it was always either a pleasant shock or a very rude awakening.

This time, it was obvious what the circumstances were.

"Mike, I-"

"We'll look after you, you know that!" Puck cut her sentence right through the middle, "We'll make sure nobody says anything bad about you and we'll beat up anyone who does! We'll make sure you always have an awesome change of clothes just in case somebody throws slushies at you, and if they do we'll beat them up!"

"What if they're girls?" Mike interjected.

"We'll…beat up their boyfriends!"

"Guys!" she almost yelled at them to stop talking, and stared at the ground. "I'm not ready to kiss Brittany in front of the whole school. I'm not ready to start walking her to every class and kiss her before she enters the room."

"You do that already, the walking to class thing…"

"Mike, I'm not comfortable. Please."

Mike sighed and smiled, walking towards her and putting his finger under her chin, lifting her face up to look at him. "OK, we'll stop."

"We just want you to be comfortable in your own school, Santana." She smiled at Puck over Mike's shoulder and nodded.

"First I wanna be comfortable in my own skin."

* * *

><p>It wasn't long after that conversation that she found herself standing up for herself.<p>

"Hey, dyke."

She slammed her locker shut and turned around sharply, pounding into the girl from behind and slamming her against the lockers.

"What the hell are you doing?" she yelled at her, but Santana just started to hit her in the stomach again and again.

"Do not call me that! You hear? I am no different from you and I'm proud of who I am! I don't get lipo every other month in hopes of looking pretty! I know who I am and I love myself!"

She felt hands wrap around her hips and pull her away, and then suddenly looked down at her clenched fists and felt ashamed.

"What is your problem?" the girl screamed at her as she nursed her stomach.

Santana wrestled out of Quinn's grip and glared at the girl, giving her the proudest smirk she could muster.

"Nothing. Not anymore. I'm comfortable in your own skin. When you find out what it feels like, come talk to me."

And with that she stormed away, her head held proudly, her Cheerio skirt swishing around her thighs.

She was back.

* * *

><p>"Final Step in accepting yourself, Santana. P. D. A."<p>

"Rachel-"

"Public Displays of Affection to your girlfriend will show the school that you are not afraid of what they think or who they are and that you are proud of being her girlfriend."

"Rachel, just-"

"Just do it!" Quinn urged her friend, pushing Santana forward. Santana shot a distasteful look at the two of them and walked forward towards Brittany, fishing her books out of her locker.

Quinn and Rachel leaned against the lockers on their side of the corridor and smirked at each other.

"We did good, Rachel," Quinn mumbled, reaching out to grab Rachel's hand and giving it a squeeze. "Our little girl's all grown up!"

Rachel blushed and leaned into Quinn's touch. "Yeah, she is…"

As Santana walked towards Brittany, she felt her hands grow clammy, her head start to spin, her heart race. She got closer to the blonde, and soon she was right next to her ditzy best friend.

Wait, scratch that.

"Hey, S!" she chirped, and closed her locker gently as she turned to look at the girl.

Santana didn't speak, she just pulled her towards her.

The boys in the hallway cat called, some of the girls gave disgusted fronts, and the Gleeks in the hall all cheered.

When she pulled painfully away from Brittany, she stared into the blonde's half-lidded eyes.

"Hey."

She wasn't just her best friend. She was so much more…

* * *

><p>As she sat in Glee that day, she asked Mr Schue to please, take the floor. He let her. She sat on a stool, grabbing the guitar and playing the opening chords to 'Be Comfortable, Creature' by Explosions in the Sky. It was instrumental, but it was catching their attention as she started to speak.<p>

"I just want to say thank you to all of you for being so awesome to me lately and protecting me, helping me out in any way. You're all so awesome and…I'm grateful. I'm grateful that you're my friends, that you're there for me, and that you've forgiven me for being a bitch to you guys all these years. And also, thank you for understanding the pain I've been through lately. Thank you all so much. And now…I'm gonna ask Puck to help me out here and play the guitar so I can sing!" she stopped strumming and handed the guitar to her lesbro, who took her place on the stool.

She nodded at Rachel and Quinn and Blaine, who started to hum with the guitar as it started to play.

"I never realized how hard it is to talk and strum at the same time, so here it goes. This is me, singing the greatest love song in the world…" she said, her eyes trained on Brittany.

"If you were falling, then I would catch you. You need a light, I'd find a match. Cuz I love the way you say good morning…And you take me the way I am!" she said, leaning down in front of Brittany and grabbing her hands, grinning widely at her. "If you are chilly, here take my sweater. Your head is aching; I'll make it better! Cuz I love the way you call me baby…And you take me the way I am…" She got up and went behind Brittany, hugging her tightly around the shoulders and closing her eyes, taking in Brittany's scent. "I'd buy you Rogaine when you start losing all your hair, sew on patches to all you tear. Cuz I love you more than I could ever promise…And you take me the way I am! You take me the way I am…You take me the way I am!" she finished off, standing in front of Brittany again and pressing their foreheads together, and putting her left hand behind Brittany's neck and her right on the blonde's thigh.

"Thank you," Brittany smiled, and Mr Schue started a round of applause.

"OK guys, let's start rehearsals for Regionals!"

Santana took her seat next to Brittany, her girlfriend, and smiled at her.

"Proudly so," she whispered.

Everything was finally going to be fine.


End file.
